Remembering Jocelyn Stevens: A newspaper innovator

Much has been written of Sir Jocelyn Stevens, Evening Standard managing editor from 1969 until 1972, since his death at the age of 82 last week.

All spoke of his managerial style: his quick temper, the firing of people. But he was far more than that. He had a mercurial personality and was the great innovator.

I knew Jocelyn Stevens for more than 40 years. We both joined Beaverbrook Newspapers on Monday, November 4, 1968 — he as personal assistant to Sir Max Aitken, the chairman; and I as deputy production manager of the Evening Standard.

Jocelyn’s first role was to organise the Daily Express London-Sydney road race, before being appointed managing director of the Evening Standard on January 1, 1969.

In the words of editor Charles Wintour: “He was outgoing, energetic, highly social, a life-enhancer, full of jokes, capable of inspiring people — and occasionally driving them to despair and sometimes to departure — totally devoted to the group. Sometimes unpredictable, he was immense fun to work with.”

Jocelyn was at his best on July 21, 1969, when Neil Armstrong became the first man to step onto the moon. Six weeks earlier, he had called his executives — all male — into his office, saying that the Americans had spent millions of dollars to put a man on the moon.

To commemorate the occasion, he announced that the Standard was going to produce Monday’s edition on Saturday, including full colour, 24 hours before the planned landing - saying that the Americans had succeeded.

In the utmost secrecy, colour pictures of the blast-off were received from NASA, and a facsimile of Armstrong on the moon was produced for the front page. With the pages locked up on the Saturday night, printing commenced early on Sunday.

Your read it here first: how the Standard produced news of the 1969 moon landing before it actually happened

By lunchtime, all the colour reels had been inserted and run off. Happy management and press crews adjourned to the nearby Grapes public house in tentative celebrations. With the papers under strict guard, there came the wait of eight hours until the successful landing.

At that time there was a 9.30am embargo between the Standard and the Evening News, but with such a great publishing day in prospect, the Standard went on sale at 7am on Monday, July 22, and was an immediate hit with commuters, many of whom thought the front-page facsimile was a picture direct from the moon. Production of the paper was frenetic, and further supplies were despatched from Samuel Stephens, the colour printers in South London.

By 8pm that day, when Armstrong’s crew had successfully blasted off on their journey back to Earth, the Standard had printed more than 1,200,000 copies in 11 editions — twice the normal amount. A champagne party in Wintour’s office was a fitting end to one of the greatest days in newspaper publishing.

Many years later, Jocelyn told me that he had received a phone call from Sir Max Aitken on the Sunday afternoon, saying “that if they did not land and one copy had got out, he was fired”.

Jocelyn replied: “Chairman, I will already have resigned.”

Dennis Griffiths is former production director of the Evening Standard and author of the definitive history of the Evening Standard, Plant Here The Standard